The Guardians of Middle-Earth
by Erin Means Peace
Summary: Henry finds a book about Middle-Earth and ends up in it, and finds that a dark curse has taken over the land. He meets the descendants of the Kings of Dale, Erebor, Mirkwood, and Bilbo Baggins and joins them on their quest to break the dark curse that has taken over Middle-Earth, while his family in Storybrooke finds a way to come to Middle-Earth to help.


**A/N:** This is a story I have been thinking about for awhile. Since OUAT started actually because I also got into my LOTR/TH obsession then and I finally came up with a good plot for it and characters! I'm also taking some stuff from Frozen and the Frozen story that OUAT did. You'll see what I mean within the next chapter or so. I've added a lot of Middle-Earth OC's and head canons in this story, as well as flashbacks to what happened before like the show does. I think it's going to be really good! Please leave some reviews whether you liked it or not and I hope you enjoy!

Henry looked around the big abandoned mansion in Storybrooke, looking for the Author's study with all of the empty books. Recently things had been pretty peaceful in Storybrooke since they rid Emma of her darkness. But Henry couldn't stop thinking about the Author's study and all of the empty books that were in it. And lately he started to think that not all of them are empty. He found the study and looked through the shelves. And sure enough he found one that wasn't empty. It was titled _Marvel_. He put it on the desk and decided to save it for later, along with one he found tilted _Star Wars_ , but then he found one titled _Middle-Earth_. Henry had been a fan of the books for a long time. When he was six Regina let him read _The Hobbit_ and he loved it and went on to read _The Lord of the Rings_ and then he got to see the movies afterwards and loved them. He knew that some of the stories in these kinds of books were different from the adaptations of them in this world. So he decided to take a peak and see if there was anything different. To his surprise the books seemed to combine both things that happened in the books and in the movies. Tauriel was in _The Hobbit_ the story as well as Legolas. And The Battle of the Five Armies happened along with the deaths of Thorin, Fili and Kili. _The Lord of the Rings_ was the same as the books and the movies, but there was something new after the picture of the ship with Frodo, Bilbo, Gandalf and the others on it leaving to the Undying Lands. There was a new title page: _The Guardians of Middle Earth_. Henry had to know more.

But when he opened the book there was only one picture. A picture of Radagast standing outside of his house, with the forest around him looking extremely sick. And some people there. Tauriel, Legolas, and another elf maiden carrying a baby elf, and a woman standing next to Tauriel, holding her hand who had pointed ears like an elf and Tauriel's red hair and some of her features but didn't look entirely elf-like. Then there was a human couple and their young son, looking about five years old standing there too. They looked royal, maybe they were Bard's descendants from Dale? There was also Frodo and a girl hobbit holding a baby hobbit. Why would Frodo come back from the Undying Lands? Something horrible must be happening in Middle-Earth. Henry turned the page to see if there was more but there was nothing there. Just the back cover of the book. What happened? Henry started to get the feeling that something had gone terribly wrong in Middle-Earth. Maybe they needed saving? Whatever it was they all looked scared of it, so it couldn't have been anything good. Should he tell everyone about this? They had finally gotten some peace, possibly in the long term. He didn't want to mess it up and make things bad again. But they could be in serious trouble. Maybe they needed a savior like Emma to come and help them. He felt around the book, looking for more clues, and then he felt a bulge in the back cover. He took out a pocket knife he found in the desk to cut the cover open and a magic bean fell out. He looked at it and held it with caution, knowing what could happen if he dropped it. He put it in his pocket and ran out to find Emma and the others, maybe they could help him figure out what was going on. But as he ran across the lawn back to the town the bean slipped out of his pocket and the portal opened. Henry froze and dropped the book, and soon after fell into the portal and then it closed, leaving the book behind on the lawn.

"Henry!" Mary-Margaret shouted as she and David ran up the lawn with Emma, Regina, Hook, Robin, Rumplestiltskin, and Belle searching for Henry.

"Henry!" David shouted and Robin comforted Regina.

"Where could he have gone?" She asks herself. "It's been hours since anyone has seen him. He could have gotten into serious trouble." She wails and Robin holds her shoulders.

"Don't worry Regina we'll find him." Robin reassures her. "The locater spell you used on his scarf brought us here."

"Yes but now it's just resting on the ground!" She tells him. "What the hell does that mean!" Emma goes over and picks up the scarf, and she sees the book underneath it.

"Hey guys I found something!" She says and they all rush over.

"I'm guessing that something isn't Henry." Regina says and sighs when she sees the book. "Great. Just great it's just one of those useless empty books in the Author's study." She says then furrows her eyebrows when she notices something about it.

"Except this book is not empty." Robin says and everyone stands in silence.

"If it's not empty then what's written in it?" Hook asks and Emma opens the book and reads it.

" _The Hobbit_." She says and everyone looks confused. "So this isn't a book about the Enchanted Forest? It's about Middle-Earth?"

"Maybe they're connected somehow?" Emma suggests. Belle steps forward.

"It's possible." Belle says and looks down at the book. "The Enchanted Forest is a big place. Maybe Middle-Earth is a part of it?"

"If it was then I think we would have noticed some hobbits running around." Regina says.

"Actually you wouldn't since they all tend to stay in Hobbitton and rarely ever leave." Emma says.

"How do you know that?" Regina asks.

"I've read the books and seen the movies." Emma answers.

"If you're so certain that the Enchanted Forest and Middle Earth are separated then how do you know what a hobbit is?" Belle asks Regina.

"I've also seen the books and the movies." Regina says.

"The important thing here is that Henry's disappearance is somehow connected to that book." Rumple says. "So I think instead of arguing over whether Middle-Earth is a part of our world or not we should see if it can tell us what happened to Henry." Everyone agrees silently and they all read the book.

"Actually..." Mary-Margaret starts and everyone stops reading and turns to her. "I have met and elf before." David stares at his wife in shock.

"When?" He asks.

"Before I met you. When I was on the run from Regina. I met an elf in the woods named Annaliece and we lived together for a little while." She explains.

"Annaliece?" Hook asks. "That sounds like a human name."

"It is." Mary-Margaret says. "She was abandoned or orphaned or both as a baby and some humans found her and raised her. They named her Annaliece."

"Can we get back to the task at hand here instead of arguing over elf baby names!" Regina scolds Hook and Mary-Margaret and they all turn back to the book.

"There's nothing about Henry in here." Regina says as they near the end of the book.

"Wait." Emma says and looks at the last page. "There's more pages here." She points out and turns it. She finds the title page _The Guardians of Middle-Earth_ and the page after that with Radagast and the others.

"What's going on there?" Belle asks. "Why is the forest so dark, it should be bright and flourishing now that the ring has been destroyed."

"They must not have gotten rid of all the evil again." Emma says and then turns the page and everyone gasps. There was a new page. Henry, hiding behind a tree in a sick looking forest, with spider webs and giant spiders crawling around it.

"We have to get in there and help him!" Regina says.

"But how are we going to get in there!" Hook says.

"We'll need some way to open up a portal to get there." Rumple says.

"And how do we do that?" Regina asks. "I don't think we have any magic with us that is strong enough to open up a portal."

"Well somehow Henry did it and that means that we can too." Emma says and everyone puts their heads together and tries to think of a way to get to Henry.

"We could use Merlin's wand again?" David suggests and Regina sighs.

"I just hope Zelena cooperates." She says.

Meanwhile Henry landed in a pile of leaves with a thud. He groaned and sat up. "Where am I?" He asks and looks around. He was in a dark forest, there was sap all over the leaves on this pile and it got on him and he stood up quickly and rubbed his hands on his jeans to get it off. There was hardly any light in this forest, just the faint glow of the sun coming in through the trees. Suddenly he remembered something familiar about this place. "Wait a minute...The movies! I've seen this place before in them! I'm in Mirkwood aren't I?" Henry says. "If I am then there should be a path right here..." He kicks some leaves around and sure enough finds an old path. "If I follow this I should be able to find some help. I know the elves aren't too kind but I'm sure they wouldn't hurt a kid." He decides and follows the path.

He does this for what seems like hours and then soon it gets hard for him to breathe. There wasn't much light getting through the trees and apparently not much air either. He found a tree and decided to climb it. He poked his head up out of the branches and expected to see the sun and some butterflies. But he didn't see any of that. The sun looked like the moon. And the sky was dark. He looked off in the distance and saw the Lonely Mountain, and a tiny bright dot that he guessed was Dale. And the Lonely Mountain had some lights in it too. He smiled a bit and started to make his way down when he felt something grab his leg. He tugged a bit but it tugged back harder and pulled him down. He screamed as he fell out of the tree and saw a spider screeching at him. He got up and backed away from it but it just got closer to him and soon he was backed up against the tree again. He heard another screech from above him and the spider looked up towards it. Henry took this as his opportunity to get away and he quickly turned around the trunk of the tree and hid behind it, breathing heavily in fear. He felt around his pockets for anything he could use as a weapon but all he managed to find was the little pocket knife from the Author's study. He feels a spider coming down the trunk and he turns to see the head looking at him. It hisses at him and Henry takes a deep breath and stabs it in one of it's eyes with the pocket knife. Blood gets all over his hand and he cringes but holds steady as the spider shrieks in pain and falls back, taking him down with it.

"There!" A female voice shouts and an arrow pierces the spider's head and after a few more flails it falls limp. Henry looks up and sees two people coming down from the trees. One lands, a man with a bow and arrows who looked like he was in his early twenties with jet black hair. He notched two arrows in his bow and shot the spiders that were approaching Henry and him and Henry looked around for some place to take cover and he ran away from the man but then a spider landed in front of him, whom the voice that he heard a few moments ago belonged to. He then realized that she was the woman that was holding Tauriel's hand in the picture he saw in the book. He turned to look at the man again and realized that he looked like the little boy with the people who looked like Bard's descendants. But while he had grown significantly and now appeared to be in his twenties this woman had not aged at all. Maybe she was an elf? She pulls her dagger out of the spider's head and approaches Henry while she readies her bow. "Can you fight?" She asks him and he stammers while she shoots an arrow over his shoulders and kills a spider that was about to attack the man.

"Not really." He answers, in awe of both of these people's skills.

"Clearly." The man says and walks over to them. He bends over the spider that Henry killed and wrenched the pocket knife out of it's eye. But it was now drenched in blood. "You actually expected to kill something with this thing? This blade wouldn't even suit a hobbit!" He chuckles and hands it back to Henry.

"You can keep it." Henry tells him when he sees how much spider blood is on it.

"What? Are you afraid of blood or something?" The man asks and Henry stays silent. "How are you supposed to help us liberate our lands and break this curse if he can't even stand the sight of blood?"

"What are you talking about?" Henry asks.

"The prophecy." The woman behind him says. "You're the last person that we need to help us break the curse and save Middle-Earth and all it's inhabitants. The prophecy said that someone else would come to Middle-Earth to aid us in breaking the curse. And that once they arrive we will be able to attack Azog's legions and take back Middle-Earth."

"But Azog was killed." Henry says. "Thorin killed him during the Battle of the Five Armies."

"So you are not from this world yet you know some of our history?" The man asks him. "Yes Thorin did kill Azog during that battle but this curse has brought him back, along with Bolg and legions of orcs that outnumber us by the thousands."

"How many of you are there?" Henry asks.

"Including you, if you are indeed here to help us, then six." The man says and Henry's face pales.

"There aren't any other people that can help?" He asks.

"The curse took them all away. The wizard Radagast was only able to protect four. So he protected all of us in accordance with the prophecy." The woman explains. "What is your name?" She asks Henry.

"I'm Henry." Henry says. "What are your names?"

"I'm Bard II." The man says.

"So you're related to Bard I? The guy who killed Smaug and reclaimed his ancestor's throne as King of Dale?" Henry asks.

"He's my great-grandfather." He says.

"And your name is?" Henry asks and turns to the woman.

"Kilïel." She answers and Henry looks confused. "We should get going. More spiders will be coming soon." She says and starts walking away from him and Bard before he can ask anymore questions.

"Where are we going?" Henry asks Bard.

"The safe house." He answers and they start walking. "You'll meet the others there."


End file.
